Michel de Montaigne Honesty Quotations

Confidence in others' honesty is no light testimony of one's own integrity.

An honest man is not accountable for the vice and folly of his trade, and therefore ought not to refuse the exercise of it. It is the custom of his country, and there is profit in it. We must live by the world, and such as we find it, so make use of it.

It is not without good reason, that he who has not a good memory should never take upon him the trade of lying.

No man is so exquisitely honest or upright in living, but that ten times in his life he might not lawfully be hanged.

It takes strong ears indeed to hear ourselves judged frankly, and because there are few who can endure criticism without being stung by it, those who venture to criticize us perform a remarkable act of friendship. For it is a healthy love that will risk wounding or offending in order to profer a benefit.

All other knowledge is hurtful to him who has not honesty and good-nature

A man must not always tell all, for that be folly; but what a man says should be what he thinks.

God defend me from being an honest man according to the description which every day I see made by each man to his own glorification

Honesty is a question of right and wrong, not a matter of policy